Challenge
by Morgana Maeve
Summary: Axel.Zexion: The subtlety is beginning to wear thin.


Challenge

Morgana Maeve

8/6/08 – Axel/Zexion. I forget. Does this have a mini fan base as well?

Warnings: Non-crack craziness. And I mention sex. Oh, the taboos.

Disclaimer: All characters belong to Square and Disney, and I'm using them without permission. Oh well.

O

One likes books, the other flames, and neither one can exist together. One is quiet, the other is loud, and there is no middle ground. One is a liar by omission, the other is a sneak, and neither can get can along. They ignore each other as part of an unspoken pact, keeping to separate halls, separate floors until one or the other has left.

They have different tastes; one with a rock-man, the other with an unattainable, but only one shows the scars of the relationship. They pretend to love in separate ways, one warm and soft and giving, the other hard and rushed and consuming.

The only concern in which they agree is their contempt for one another. They both sneer at each other's choices, both battle in tall white chairs, metaphorical barbs darting across the other members, striking home in hollow skin.

And yet, for all the animosity, each one knows what the other is doing. One knows by scent, the other by spying, and neither can stand not knowing. This aberration drives Roxas to the point of maniacal sex, but Lexaeus is too nice to mention it.

That is just another one of their differences.

So the differences pile up in towering heaps of petty theft and calculated sabotage, and it soon becomes a challenge between the two, a contest to see who can kill the other in such a subtle way, it is unnoticed. And both have their recruits.

This is where Zexion wins. Lexaeus joins him only through loyalty, but Vexen follows because his unstable mind can no longer distinguish half-truths from help, and Zexion preys upon this weakness. Axel loses only because the rest of the Organization could care less for such squabbles, and Roxas, out sheer meanness, refuses to help.

The Superior is well aware of the murderous hate between two of his members, and he plays on this, forcing Axel to become the assassin Marluxia wishes to be. Together, they are deployed to the Castle Oblivion, one sentenced to lower floors, the other waiting to spring the trap.

Time is ample, and Axel plots and schemes as members are injured and drawn closer and closer to that edge of nothingness. And amazingly, the fate that Axel has stopped believing in grants him a surprising chance.

He happens onto it by accident, a misdemeanor venture into Vexen's private quarters. What he finds is fly-ridden, moldy, and stinking, a bloody mess of fleshy scraps and sinewy muscle, and for the first time, Axel flees, slamming the door to that dark room behind him. He leans against it, breathing hard, not from the stench or the shock of that crusty thing, but from the crazed laughter echoing from an unknown corner.

He watches silently as the thing grows and matures into a replica of a boy taunted by darkness, and then he realizes that this puppet will be useful. And so he waits until he's sure he can use it.

There are times when he thinks his beautiful plan will fail, thinks that Sora will kill the creation in a fit of anger, but fate is being kind to him and cruel to another, and the replica lives on. It is by sheer luck that it survives having its heart broken, and again sheer luck that Naminé fixes it in the most curious of ways.

By this time, there are not many surviving member left, less witnesses for his grand plan's final performance, and he doesn't know if he should be happy or sad. The truth is he should be neither, but Nobodies sometimes confuse their feelings.

In the end, it comes back to two, two Nobodies who can't stand one another, and this is when Axel wins. His plan, made with sickening love, is ready to reveal itself in all of its twisted wrongness.

Zexion never sees it coming. Injured and weak from a battle with what could one day be the new Superior, he is vulnerable and depleted.

He smells Axel first, scent of burning flesh and charring bones. The replica is with him, smelling of lies and blood. And that's when Zexion knows. What pretty words Axel has used, he cannot say, but now is when subtlety flies away, and Zexion can accept it because, like always, it is too late.

Being drained is not fun, nor is it pleasant, and it is not as good as dying on the battlefield like all the others. But as he feels his dust collecting in the voided patches of the replica, Zexion has the last laugh, for now he will always live on in this machine of stagnant blood and cogs. Axel watches from the shadows. Typical Axel, never owning up to the problems he creates.

And that is probably why they hate each other. They are both too alike, and they both see their flaws magnified in one another. What Zexion did to Riku is something that Axel would have done better, that shadowy Destiny Islands created to trap a reeling mind. It reeks of something Axel would do for kicks.

But Zexion can care less, for cognizant thought is gone, and he is merging with the replica. He damns Vexen to fiery hell for this creation.

Much to the dismay of Roxas, Axel keeps the replica, playing mind games with it while Roxas watches in jealousy, arms crossed over his chest, blue eyes blazing. And maybe this is another reason why he leaves. But Axel is happy for the most part because as long as he keeps the replica around, he always knows where Zexion is.

O

I would like to make one thing clear. Axel is crazy. It is no longer disputable. The man is nucking futs. (And I like it.)

HappyDragon from indirectly gave me the idea for this. She has an amazing one-shot – Grief's Adept (not recommended for young viewers) – that dealt with Axel's betrayal of Zexion. I didn't want to leach off her story too much, so I decided to make Axel a little more crazy and have that as he reason for killing Zexion instead of what she had.

Reviews are my life support. This daily one-shot thing is killing me.


End file.
